Obituaries. 
3 
1919-20.] 
Ben Nevis Mr Mackay Bernard contributed no less than £2000 to its 
upkeep. He was an active member of the Meteorological Society, and 
filled the office of President from 1912-15. 
He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1887, 
and died on April 19, 1919. 
Mr Thomas Fairley was born in Glasgow in 1843, and received the 
greater part of his education at Edinburgh. He displayed a remarkable 
aptitude for science, especially in relation to chemistry, which he had the 
good fortune to study under the late Lord Playfair, who was then Professor 
of Chemistry at Edinburgh University. After acting as assistant to Pro- 
fessor Playfair for some years, he became lecturer in chemistry at the Leeds 
School of Medicine, and science master at the Leeds Grammar School. 
He gradually devoted himself to the general practice of an analytical and 
consulting chemist. In 1873 he was appointed public analyst for Leeds 
and the North Riding, and chemist to the Yorkshire Agricultural Society. 
Many honorary yet important offices were filled by Mr Fairley, among 
them being that of the president of the Leeds Naturalists’ Field Association. 
He served on different committees of the Leeds Institute of Science, Art, and 
Literature, and shortly after the transfer of the educational work of that 
institution to the Leeds Corporation he became chairman, the presidency 
being accepted by the late Lord Airedale. During his chairmanship of the 
Institute he was elected Chairman of the Council of the Association of 
Technical Institutions of Great Britain and Ireland for the year 1908. 
One of the early members of the Institute of Chemistry of Great Britain 
and Ireland, he served at various times as a member of the Council and 
as one of the examiners of candidates for the Institute’s Diploma of 
Associateship. Another scientific body in which he took special interest 
was the Society of Chemical Industry, of the Council of which he was 
a member, as well as chairman and secretary of the Yorkshire section of 
the society, resigning the secretaryship last year. He became a Fellow 
of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1875. 
Mr Fairley’s lectures on scientific subjects were always lucid and 
informing, while his contributions to scientific publications were valuable 
records. He wrote for the journal of the Chemical Society and the journal 
of the Society of Chemical Industry, and was the author of articles in 
Thorpe’s new Dictionary of Applied Chemistry. His active interest in the 
British Association extended over a long period, and he frequently contri- 
buted papers or took part in the discussions, particularly in the physics 
or chemistry section. 
